


A Step

by jojotier



Category: Nanalan' (TV)
Genre: Crack Treated Seriously, Cults, Gen, I want to go to bed, Purple Prose, Stealing, Surreal, The Author Regrets Everything, Thievery, anti-crack ?, i barely have a memory of w riting this tbh, i tried to make this sound legitimately weird and haunting, maybe? kind of ?, or i mean, the peepo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-22
Updated: 2017-10-22
Packaged: 2019-01-21 02:57:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12448236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jojotier/pseuds/jojotier
Summary: Apparently I wrote something while heavily sleep deprived at one point, lost it, and then found it again- so for your enjoyment- the beginning of the quest of the peepo! God I'm so sorry





	A Step

**Author's Note:**

> Sometimes things that are well written,.,., are worse

Mona hummed to herself, stepping out into the bright sunshine and looking out over her Nanna’s yard. It was a familiar sight, with a tree growing up from the ground, seemingly casting an eternal shade over a small plot of the place where Mona could lay down and rest. The leaves fanned out, a bright, healthy green, and Mona knew that nothing was different. She knew that she’d looked upon this scene thousands of times before, and yet for some reason, she felt a strange… emptiness, inside her belly. A wisp of cold, like a snowflake had formed in her tummy and was swishing around in there until it eventually melted. 

But Mona was foolish, still bright eyed and bushy tailed as she brushed it off, figuring that she was just being silly. She could hear her Nanna in the kitchen from her place in the doorway, hear the soft humming as she hung up laundry for the afternoon, and allowed herself to think that nothing was amiss as she looked around at her surroundings, a slight hum escaping her. There were so many amazing things everywhere, and it was such a wonderful world! How could she possibly choose just one thing to do while she waited for her Nanna to come out to pick some of the lovely fruits of the soil, so that they all could have a lovely dinner?

Then, there was a sound. Four heavy paws, and an elongated snout sniffing and opening wide, and then- chomp! Just like that, Mona caught sight of the dog as it bit straight into one of Nanna’s juicy tomatoes!

Pastel green skin somehow paling to something more akin to an off candy mint, she rushed over to where the naughty pup was chewing, and opened her mouth to scold him. “No!!” She cried, mouth unhinging strangely in a way that she paid no mind to, a black hole that looked out into the world around her. “Don’t!! Those ’re… for dinner.” She eventually slurred out, voice impeded by the sheer fact that she was literally three years old (for how long, she did not know) and didn’t have much of a grasp on the English language yet. The dog cocked its head, and perhaps cowered backwards slightly as she pointed to the vegetables in turn, struggling to say their names. Lettuce, radish, and then… there was one more plant left. Just one more wonder for the dinner table.

There, in neat rows, as fat as her strange three fingered sausage hands, were green pods that seemed to almost shimmer in the light. Mona was dazzled immediately, and she couldn’t help the way that her soulless black eyes widened in awe. That was going to be on the dinner table… and something was inside! She grasped the back of the dog’s neck, pointing to the strange object and muttering in reverence, “An’ that’s… the peepo.” Thus she had christened the strange object as a peepo. For a moment longer the child stood in awe, and then she turned, the maroon fabric of her dress swishing around legs that may or may not have actually existed, and busied herself with thinking.

Just how would Nanna use a peepo for dinner? Would it be decoration, to hang around the cereal bowl? Or would they eat it, shell and all? Or would Mona never know what secrets it kept? If she had a heart, it would be beating faster in anticipation as she wondered, gaping maw unhinged and her eyes twinkled like there were distant, dying stars trapped in the large, strange vats of boiling squid ink that they contained. She fantasized, she theorized, and all while this was happening, she didn’t recognize the gentle pap pap pap of heavily furred paws tiptoeing past, another gaping maw opening wide for the very treasured thing that she had decided to guard until Nanna came out to tell her a little more of their plans for it. She couldn’t hear the telling rumbling of a starved stomach until it was too late, and when she whirled around, the dog had taken one of the peepos into his mouth, biting down on it with such force!

“Russel!!” Mona roared, any shock that might have passed by her mostly indifferent, lifeless features melting into anger. “You… took! The PEEPO!” The dog shook, and then just like that he was off, leaving Mona there with nothing but her own anger and determination. He took the peepo, but she would be sure to get it back. She had to, or else her Nanna’s dinner would be ruined! She didn’t want her poor old Nanna to be deprived of whatever strange magic that was contained inside the thin walls of the peepo, even if there were about a dozen others still on the vine. No, this one peepo must have been important, or else the dog wouldn’t have taken it, would he have?

She began to run after the dog, feeling grass under her feet despite the fact that she was wearing shoes and despite the fact that she was also barefoot. Maybe she was in socks? Whatever the case may be, it must have been an arbitrary detail, because Rusel was getting away with the peepo! She pumped her weird spaghetti legs faster, pigtails bouncing in their little fuchsia prisons as she reached out, trying to catch the naughty animal as he crawled underneath the fence, struggling for a bit before he made it to the other side. Mona stopped. She stared up at the large, brown wooden fence that had stood sentry to her playtime many a warm afternoon, standing as tall and proud as soldiers, and now as intimidating as prison guards trying to keep a particularly volatile juvenile delinquent inside. 

Mona had never been Out. All she knew was Mommy’s house, a car, and Nanna’s house and yard. What could even be out there?

The thought of the unknown sent a certain thrill throughout her entire tiny three year old stuffed body, and she shuddered in both fear and excitement. She was going to go outside, and then she was going to find the Peepo. It was what she had to do, now that she had gazed upon its almost silvery splendor, now that the thought of what could be inside would plague her every waking moment. Never mind the fact that there were literally seventeen other peepos five feet from her- no, now was the time to find The peepo, the one that truly mattered. And so, Mona got down on her belly and shimmied forward, finding the hole under the fence to be just big enough for her. She closed her eyes tightly, unsure of what she’d find on the other side, as she felt the wind rustle the leaves in the trees above…

When she opened her eyes, there was no more fence. The only thing she could see was sand, yellowed with age and grainy as they stuck to her weird felt like skin. She couldn’t see her Nanna’s yard, not anymore. Now the only thing she saw was yellow, and she stood up, scanning around herself. In the sky, there was one, long, branching crack that shone in so many beautiful colors that a strange, alien warmth burst in her chest. Looking to where the crack went, she could see a large purple city rising, high spires reflected back in her lifeless eyes. 

Mona could no longer hear the steps of the fiend that had stolen the precious treasure that she was supposed to guard, but perhaps this was never meant to be easy. Perhaps finding the peepo would take longer than she thought, but she needed to find it. It was imperative that she bring it home to her Nanna so that they could unlock its secrets, and then maybe Mona would get to have that dinner that she had been promised. So the little girl pressed forwards, towards the violet city in the distance, eyes locked upon the shining spires that seemed to beckon her like a beacon with the voices of many dark beings lapping at her vision. Now, her journey had to have truly begun.

She was going to find the Peepo.

**Author's Note:**

> i have just as many questions as you do


End file.
